Thank you to (especially) Alan, Kate and BillW for that making all that happen as well as the performers obviously. A (very) sad but beautiful day.Photos used with kind permission of Bruce Butler(FLAC) Recording HERE

A time-lapse of all terrorist attacks with MORE than 20 fatalities between 1.12.2000 and 13.11.2015 by http://www.milanvuckovic.com
Soruces:
START terrorism database "GTD" (2000-2014)
Various News Agencies (2015)
Important Note: due to the large amount of data used, there are likely to be mistakes (exact chronology, location, casualties etc.). This video should serve as an approximation. (Especially in the messy parts.)
Typical error would be: GTD had sometimes the "at least" casualties in the database. Istanbul Bombings of 2003 are not present on the map because of this. I also used different definitions of terrorism regarding the area and time of attacks.
About the copy at the end:
Historians debate about weather terrorist groups are destined to fail or not. Some say that authentic terrorist organizations achieve partial goals only. Many regard John Brown (approx. 150 years ago) as the most successful terrorist till this day – But you might read the essays: "How Successful Is Terrorism?" (James M. Lutz and Brenda J. Lutz) and "Why Terrorism Does Not Work" (M. Abrahms) and you will find out what this message is exactly about: Deterring potential future terrorism by education

Tuesday, 17 November 2015

The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) has been truly devastating to those it comes in contact with and bloody to those under its control. Its sudden rise and expansion in 2014 has perplexed many. It has humiliated its enemies, including those in Damascus, Baghdad, Tehran and Washington. Armed with extensive weaponry, boasting an international fighting force and adept in the art of digital media propaganda, the so-called Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant has become the de facto authority across an area the size of Jordan. This two-part series peels back the rhetoric to examine how a volunteer organisation managed to rise up from the ashes of post-invasion Iraq and defeat standing armies many times its size and capacity. How did it begin? How did it grow so astonishingly quickly? And how is it being used by global and regional powers to change the geopolitical map of the Middle East? With critical testimony from informed insiders and experts from across three continents, as well as original footage from Syria and Iraq, this series mixes documentary and discussion to unravel the interweaving nexus of events and alliances, at once aligned and conflicting, that have given rise to the world's most notorious, and powerful, insurgent group. Al Jazeera's former Middle East correspondent, Sue Turton, narrates the documentary and also moderates a studio discussion between Iraq's former national security adviser, Mowaffak al Rubaie; Ali Khedery, special adviser to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq; and Australian journalist and Middle East correspondent, Martin Chulov

On Friday 13th November from 20:00 to 22:00 Berlin Time, Jon Evans and Julian Percy together with Nikolas Schreck commemorated their friend in a two hour long tribute with memories and his music. There is a short interview with Annie Stubbs.
John Russell Murphy (11 July 1959 – 11 October 2015), sometimes credited as Jonh Murphy, was an Australian drummer, percussionist and multi-instrumental session musician who played in Australian and British post-punk, ambient and industrial music groups. He was the son of an Australian jazz drummer Russ Murphy who played for many years with the Graeme Bell All Stars, stalwarts of the early Australian music scene.
Tracklist:
NEWS - chop chop chop
Hymn of the satanic empire (cover)
Associates - nude spoons (peel session)
Whirlywirld - sextronics
Shinning Vril - schmerz (cover)
Louis Tillett - children of the cave
Naevus - meat on meat
Orchestra of Skin and Bone - sometimes
Current 93 - maldoror est mort
The Butcher Shop - iron pig
Lark Blames - mondo chimney
The Dumb and the Ugly - atmosphere 145
Last Dominion Lost - S.E.A.T.O
Hugo Klang - beat up the old shack
Knifeladder - suffer in silence
Max Q - concrete
John Murphy / Ben Taylor
Bushpig - speedy's splitting skin
The Grimsel Path - carousel (live)
Nikolas Schreck - tower transmissions (live)

An IR track "Sacred Dub for Nelly Stharre: Dr Das African Anarchist Mix" honoring our dead friend and IR conspirator Nelly Stharre who passed away in tragic circumstances. Many thanks to Dr D as for this dub mix and to the vocalists Tohununo, Jimmy Dick and The Ghost. Lyrics written by Tohununo and The Ghost. Music by Dr Das.

Last night in Sydney, deeply engrossed in a newspaper, I missed my bus stop by a long shot. I looked up to see a neighbourhood I didn't recognise so I dinged the bell and was deposited outside a brightly lit Ferrari dealership.
I called an Uber and it found me there within minutes and me being jaded by cunning detouring cab drivers of the past I insisted my driver use the GPS.
"Ok," he said broad-smiling and tapped the screen, "but GPS, for all it's technology, does not have human common sense. Sometimes I shake my head at it."
I sunk down in the seat and we settled into the usual small talk, his shift hours and workload. I commented on new construction we passed on the site of my favourite old auction house. Sydney is changing fast he told me. Like everywhere I said sounding like a boring old crony. He was from India he said and knew the area well. I looked over and could see even with him sitting down he was small framed, his chin almost in line with the top of the steering wheel.
"Speaking of human common sense," he said bringing it back to the GPS, " I can't understand these who go around killing other people... in cold blood."
Although it's been on everyone's mind today it was still an abrupt shift. He'd dovetailed it into the conversation as if he'd been waiting to. I recognised the moment that sometimes happens in the driver/passenger relationship where the banal switches to the deeply personal, the freedom allowed strangers who are trapped in a finite time period together. I straightened myself in my seat.
"I'm a Muslim," he said almost as a confession, "and this is not what I was taught as a child."
I just sat quietly and listened. It felt like he needed to talk. He said he was praying at a mosque in Zetland when he got my ride request. He'd been praying for most of the day.
"These people say they act under the name of Islam. I've studied religion, theology. The etymology of the word Islam comes from a word that means Peace."
He told me how one of his teachers had explained to him that people will angle teachings of the Koran to reflect their own needs. The finance banker will use certain lines to justify his actions, just as the jihadist will do the same. We talked about how many other religious faiths have been exploited too. I looked over to see him wipe tears from his eyes.
"Doesn't the Koran have a basic law... like the Bible... that says Thou Shalt Not Kill?" I asked.
"Of course!" he exclaimed, "The second highest law says that if you kill a single soul it's like killing the soul of all humanity. If you save a single soul, you save all humanity."
We'd reached our destination, just off King St, but still we sat in the car and talked (he turned the meter off!). Light rain sprinkled the windscreen as we watched the Saturday night revellers stream across the intersection. It felt like we were two cops, from different walks of life, on a movie stakeout.
He quoted Koran verses often brandished by fundamentalists, robbed of their ancient historical context. We mourned the victims in Paris. We mourned the young martyrs whose minds have been brainwashed. "It appeals to their child fantasies," he said. We searched for some kind of coda that could send us both on our ways.
I tried lamely with, "Well, it's just something we all have to accept as part of our lives now."
"What were your first thoughts when you heard the news this morning?" he asked.
"Well to be honest, even though I knew they were all safe, I thought of my own family. And friends," I said striving for a better answer, "I felt devastated for the people involved in Paris. But always in a tragedy I feel a kind of worry for my family and friends."
"That's a value of life!" he said, "That's love! That is the only defence!"
We were both okay to end on that. I closed the door of the car and rushed off to my waiting meal with some of those dear friends. "I just had an emotional Uber experience," I told them, and my mind kept returning to it for the rest of the night. And now today I didn't wanna write this as some kind of statement. I just want to tell you about my brief random conversation with a sad Muslim Sydney Uber driver, who's religion is being taken from himVia

Two weeks ago in a single Assad airstrike on a marketplace in Douma, 80+ civilians were killed and 500+ were injured. Did Facebook ask anyone to change their Facebook profiles then?
Two years ago, in a single chemical weapons attack, nearly 1700 civilians - including hundreds of children - were gassed to death. Did Youtube change its logo in solidarity with them?
This is a serious point. This isn't just more moralizing. Doesn't anyone see a connection between how the Syrian people feel so absolutely forsaken, and the fact that IS can operate there?
The fact that the world says that "all human lives are equal", but it treats deaths in a European capital as far more worthy of solidarity than in a Middle Eastern capital, is a core ISIS recruitment pointIyad El-BaghdadiAnd I am guilty of not posting what happened in Beirut and Baghdad here too

A red rose, with a sign that reads, “In the name of what?” was placed in a bullet hole in the window of a Japanese restaurant next to ‘La Belle Equipe’ on Rue de Charonne. Photograph: Loic Venance /AFP/Getty ImagesVia

Saturday, 14 November 2015

no one leaves home unlesshome is the mouth of a sharkyou only run for the borderwhen you see the whole city running as wellyour neighbors running faster than youbreath bloody in their throatsthe boy you went to school withwho kissed you dizzy behind the old tin factoryis holding a gun bigger than his bodyyou only leave homewhen home won’t let you stay.no one leaves home unless home chases youfire under feethot blood in your bellyit’s not something you ever thought of doinguntil the blade burnt threats intoyour neckand even then you carried the anthem underyour breathonly tearing up your passport in an airport toiletssobbing as each mouthful of papermade it clear that you wouldn’t be going back.you have to understand,that no one puts their children in a boatunless the water is safer than the landno one burns their palmsunder trainsbeneath carriagesno one spends days and nights in the stomach of a truckfeeding on newspaper unless the miles travelledmeans something more than journey.no one crawls under fencesno one wants to be beatenpitiedno one chooses refugee campsor strip searches where yourbody is left achingor prison,because prison is saferthan a city of fireand one prison guardin the nightis better than a truckloadof men who look like your fatherno one could take itno one could stomach itno one skin would be tough enoughthego home blacksrefugeesdirty immigrantsasylum seekerssucking our country dryniggers with their hands outthey smell strangesavagemessed up their country and now they wantto mess ours uphow do the wordsthe dirty looksroll off your backsmaybe because the blow is softerthan a limb torn offor the words are more tenderthan fourteen men betweenyour legsor the insults are easierto swallowthan rubblethan bonethan your child bodyin pieces.i want to go home,but home is the mouth of a sharkhome is the barrel of the gunand no one would leave homeunless home chased you to the shoreunless home told youto quicken your legsleave your clothes behindcrawl through the desertwade through the oceansdrownsavebe hungerbegforget prideyour survival is more importantno one leaves home until home is a sweaty voice in your earsaying-leave,run away from me nowi dont know what i’ve becomebut i know that anywhereis safer than here- Warsan Shire

The barbarity of terrorism has just taken a historical step. A massacre coordinated in the heart of Paris and the Stade de France was conducted with cold determination, in order to kill as many as possible.Even at the height of the clashes linked to the Algerian civil war in the 1990s, France had never experienced this level of violence. And it is France, its policies and its international role which are targeted by the killers. Unlike the attacks on Charlie Hebdo or the Hyper Cacher, which were precise in their execution, tonight’s attacks are acts of indistinct cruelty unleashed to inspire terror across the nation.The sites of the attacks were all dedicated to entertainment and friendliness, were purposely in the line of fire, as a way to underline the fact that French people are now under menace in their everyday life, as they simply go out with friends.We are horrified in front of the vastness of this massacre, and compassion for the victims is the most humane and immediate reaction to have. We first and foremost think of the victims and their families. As for the rest - it has to focus on cold blood and civism. French society should arm itself with the courage to not give an inch to the killers, and has to show vigilance and the undying will to face the horror with the force of the law and solidarity.The Republic, its mobilised state and the law will take on the battle without trembling, with great efficiency. It is impossible to not link those bloody attacks to those taking place in the Middle East, where France plays its part. Our country must continue its action unblinkingly. Only our country’s unity, as with stand strong and voluntary and carried by our values, will allow France to take its greatest challenge.

Friday, 13 November 2015

How about an album you find yourself going back to over and over again? Probably Pink Floyd, Dark Side of the Moon. Me and millions of other people. It’s just the perfect shape, the perfect exploration of the human experience. If someone asked me, how would you describe Pink Floyd, Dark Side of the Moon? I wouldn’t say happy or sad, I would say human

My dear friend and brother passed away last night.He had been ill for sometime but that does not make it any easier when the time finally comes. I have known Phil since he was 21 and he was one hell of a character. Fortunately we made some fantastic music together and I have many many fond memories of our time together. Rest in Peace, Phil!